And afterward they asked for a king; so God gave them Saul the son of Kish, a man of the tribe of Benjamin, for forty years. Acts 13:21

Musings from Paul’s sermon in Acts 13…

God saved His people, Israel. He saved them for Himself. He was their Savior and He was their King.

But God’s people wanted to be ruled by a human king like the kinds that ruled the pagan nations around them. God warned them in Deuteronomy 17:14 that they would do this, and in 1 Samuel 8:19-20 they did precisely what God said they would do.

As R.C. Sproul used to say, every time we sin, in that moment we love our sin more than we love God’s Son. Stated a different way, every time we sin, we want to be ruled by someone or something other than by God! Oh Lord, expand and deepen our love for Jesus!

The Church does the same thing. As the Roman Catholic church dresses her popes in costly vestments and seats them on golden thrones, they do so that they may be led by worldly kings. But is the so-called evangelical Church today any less guilty of the same thing? Have not many “reimagined” church, worship, and the faith itself to be cheap imitations of the world to be attractive and liked by the world? Oh Lord, expand and deepen our love for Jesus!